Transitions are hard. Changing the soil where you spread your roots brings loss and an ungroundedness… But, eventually, one notices that the beauty you shared with those you left behind accompanies you more than you expect: The Tomato Garden, part III.
We moved homes, so we left most of our Tomato Garden behind, except for two tomato offsprings from our dear cherry tomato friends:
Transplanting Tomato Offsprings
They didn’t do well. The new soil, our business settling our own roots… they dried up. I wasn’t sure if I would see them reapper again, as they did in their previous home. But, once again, this summer, a little volunteer appeared.
Continuation
My life is a little like that, as our life transitions, my experiences, friends, seem to be lost. But, unexpectedly, one discovers they accompany you in new ways:
Colibríes
The Tomato Garden Part 3 — a new road ahead, with beautiful old companions
Three years ago life put a beautiful patch of soil in our home where, fortunately, we decided to plant two little tomato plants. We hadn’t grown herbs, fruits, or vegetables before, but these two little plants survived and flourished in spite of our inexperience. This is the origin of our Tomato Garden.
Tomato Garden
The cherry tomatoes’ sweetness that was offered to us made irresistible caring for them. They grew so much, not only the two plants we originally planted, but also a little volunteer who came with them and arrived to our garden, a “Better Boy” tomato seed.
Volunteer Tomato Plant
Caring for these tomato plants has been so enriching — I started to understand that a plant is not like a human, cutting her stems, leaves, or fruits is not necessarily harmful to them. On the contrary, this is often what prevents them from getting rotten or infested by some of the many little insect creatures I got to meet through this experience.
Another enriching regular little creature I encountered, was the tomato hornworm, which is not actually a worm, but a caterpillar, a quite large caterpillar that loves tomatoes. At the beginning, I considered removing them from the plants, but why should I eat all the tomatoes or prevent them from eating the leaves that would only eventually fall. There was more than plenty for all of us.
Plus, I really enjoyed being surprised when out of the blue I suddenly noticed one of these tomato lovers just in front of me. A little fellow previously lost from my sight given their green camouflage.
Sharing Fruits
The importance of water and the time of the day when one waters and how this differs through the seasons is something one learns when caring for these tomatoes. If I water too little, the plants’ fruits start looking yellowish and pale. If I water all of the plant (leaves and stems) or too late at night, prepare for unexpected insect visitors.
Finally, one learns that in this land tomatoes are not perennial plants. Their lifetime is closer to a year. So, as time passed, I saw them slowly dry up and become thin and brown like a branch… I couldn’t dare to cut them. I just saw them continue their path. Their path led to these visitors, which I called Bowsers (as they were little, spiky and roundish Mario Bros Bowser looking like creatures). They gave me goosebumps and started to spread all over the plant. At this point, I understood it was time to let them go. So, I knelt next to their root and cut them down.
Bowsers Arrive
I thought “Maybe I will plant some tomato plants again next year”, but this didn’t happen, it was not necessary. It turned out that the plants I cut, were not totally gone. As the weather became warmer, little plants started to emerge from under the ground. The little seeds of our two little cherry plants had not left, they were just preparing to restart their life above ground, once again.
Tomato Garden
“In naming the plants who shower us with goodness, we recognize that these are gifts from our plant relatives, manifestations of their generosity, care, and creativity. When we speak of these not as things or products or commodities, but as gifts, the whole relationship changes. I can’t help but gaze at them, cupped like jewels in my hand, and breathe out my gratitude.”
“At one point I was visited by the temptation to use the theme of nymphéas [water lilies] for a decoration. Carried the length of the walls, enveloping the entire interior with its unity, it would attain the illusion of a whole without end, of a watery surface without horizon and without banks; nerves overstrained by work would be relaxed there, following the restful example of the still waters, and to whomsoever lived there, it would offer an asylum of peaceful meditation at the center of a flowering aquarium.”
In his Water Lilies, Monet sought consolation from the loss of his second wife, Alice, and his eldest son, Jean.
Days and hours with his pond, surrendering to the ever changes of life.
“Do you really think that the excitement and ecstasy with which I express and fulfill my passion for nature simply leads to a fairyland?… People who hold forth on my painting conclude that I have arrived at the ultimate degree of abstraction and imagination that relates to reality. I should much prefer to have them acknowledge what is given, the total self-surrender. I applied paint to these canvases the same way that monks of old illuminated their books of hours; these owe everything to the collaboration of solitude and passion, to an earnest, exclusive attention bordering on hypnosis… I set my easel in front of this bit of water that adds a pleasant freshness to my garden; in circumference it is less than 200 meters and its image evokes the idea of infinity for you; you ascertain in it, as in a microcosm, the existence of the elements and the instability of the universe that changes from minute to minute under our eyes. ”
“The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden.” – Thomas Moore, The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life, 1996, p. 101
Algo que comencé a notar en estos últimos meses, y me sorprendió mucho, es como características tan simples, definen monumentalmente nuestra experiencia diaria y nuestra vida. Por ejemplo, algo básico, que todo ser humano tiene, como su sexo al nacer, crea un sinfín de expectativas en los demás y en uno mismo sobre como debemos comportarnos, desear, trabajar y sentir.
De las expectativas y prejuicios que más se intensifican son los relacionados a nuestra apariencia física. Si creciste como mujer en gran parte del mundo, el ideal corporal es que te veas como un palo de delgada. Por lo cual, todo tipo de personas comienzan a tener una opinión y creer tener el derecho a compartírnosla.
Estos comentarios y creencias conlleva a despertar una relación con nuestra imagen corporal muy dañina. Como a un cachorrito que traté de educar en mi niñez con gritos y regaños para que no hiciera popó dentro de la casa, lo cual lo llevó a que comenzara a llorar cuando quería hacer popo, similar se vuelve la relación con nuestro cuerpo y con la comida bajo estas expectativas, juicios y críticas que se dan y reciben sin ton ni son. Las cuales buscan regular nuestra forma de comer y nuestra apariencia física.
Mi relación con la comida surge dentro de esta visión social, en donde el comer o no comer se asocia a sentimientos de vergüenza, al aborrecimiento a ciertas versiones de nuestro cuerpo y a la recriminación y culpa con uno mismo. Todos esto relacionado con algo tan esencial como comer e intensificado debido a algo tan elemental, como ser mujer.
Conforme cultivo mi jardín y aprendo más sobre la relación entre las plantas que cultivamos para comer y el impacto que tienen en ellas los minerales, pesticidas, luz y agua que les damos como alimento, mi entendimiento sobre mi cuerpo y lo que como, se transforma, haciendo emerger una nueva posibilidad de ser.
En esta visión, lo que elijo comer no es en base a lo que juicios y prejuicios corporales, sino se convierte en un regalo, un ofrecimiento de la tierra a lo que mi cuerpo necesita para ser feliz. El alimento que decido elegir se vuelve un acto de amor a uno mismo, aunque la nutrición de este amor no llegase a ir acompañada al cuerpo del modelo de revista o de televisión.
Al igual como una planta requiere nitrógeno, potasio y otros minerales, mi cuerpo también necesita un poco de agua, de azúcares, de grasas. Cuando le comienzo a poner atención, me doy cuenta de que así como no todas las plantas son iguales, no todos los cuerpos necesitan lo mismo para estar bien. Por ejemplo, comparado con otras personas que conozco, a los granos refinados los digiero muy rápido, lo que conduce a que almacene más energía en mi cuerpo de la que puedo consumir. En base a este aprendizaje, veo que con tan sólo cambiar el arroz blanco (que por cierto, aumenta el riesgo de diabetes) por un grano entero (como la quínoa o el arroz silvestre), mi grasa corporal regresa a mi nivel natural.
Arroz Blanco y Quinoa
Enfocándome en descubrir cual es el nitrógeno necesario para mi jardín, en lugar de tratar de encajar mi grasa corporal a las expectativas de lo que una mujer debe o no debe ser, es una relación en la cual el amor de este entendimiento hace florecer mi cuerpo como la flor que realmente soy y no el intento de flor que otros creen nací para ser.
“In order to be loved, we have to love, which means we have to understand.” “If you offer your beloved something she does not need, that is not maitri. You have to see her real situation.” “If you were to say to me, `Thây, I love you so much I would like you to eat some of this durian [which Thây doesn’t like],’ I would suffer. You love me, you want me to be happy, but you force me to eat durian. That is an example of love without understanding. Your intention is good but you don’t have the correct understanding.” “Without understanding, your love is not true love. You must look deeply in order to see and understand the needs, aspirations and suffering of the ones you love. Love brings us joy and well-being. It is as natural as the air. We are loved by the air; we need fresh air to be happy and well.”
“The time has come to reclaim the stolen harvest and celebrate the growing and giving of good food as the highest gift and the most revolutionary act.”
I have been very fortunate that the patch of soil in the Tomato Garden is so rich in nutrients that there is no need to work on improving the soil-food available to plants. However, I didn’t know this at the beginning. New to gardening, I just went and bought a bag of organic soil and one of plant food with added fertilizer, assuming that is what one does to grow healthy plants.
Until one day, a friend with much more gardening experience told me that this shouldn’t be necessary. Many leaves and branches of the oldest tree in the backyard, at some point, were heavily trimmed and left to decompose in the patch that is now “The Tomato Garden”. Hence, he said, the soil should be very rich for plants.
Plants eat mostly Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Carbon, Oxygen, Phosphorus and Potassium. Except for Carbon, plants absorb these foods through their roots after these nutrients are decomposed into ions by soil microorganisms. For example, plants eat Nitrogen, but they can’t consume this Nitrogen in its atmospheric form. To eat it, it first needs to be transformed by microorganisms, such as the bacteria Azotobacter, who transform it into ammonia (NH4+) and, in this new state, plants’ roots can then absorb it.
My inexperience feeding plants is, unfortunately, quite common amongst home gardeners. Buying food for the garden, without understanding if the plants are already able to find all the food they need in the soil, leads to the excessive fertilizer not absorbed by plants to flow to lakes, rivers and the ocean, contributing this way to Algal blooms. [2]
The Nitrogen and Phosphorus found in fertilizers, it is not only a delicious food for land plants, but also for algae and other plants in the water. When algae are overfed, they grow excessively. This growth can cause oxygen depletion in the water, killing, besides the algae, other plants and animals that also need oxygen to survive. [3]
Algal Bloom in a Park near my house after a rainy day
But, as I discovered, chemical fertilizers are not necessary to nurture garden plants. For example, when planting legumes, such as peas, clovers and beans, one wouldn’t need additional Nitrogen (one of the most important nutrients for plants and generally the most limiting). On the contrary, legumes form a symbiotic relationship with rhizobia, a soil-dwelling bacteria, that creates a natural Nitrogen fertilizer for the plant, soil and neighboring plants. [4] Because of this, planting legumes is considered a cleaner alternative to using chemical fertilizers when Nitrogen is missing in the soil.
There are many other natural ways of helping plants get the food they need, like growing multiple crops at the same time, leaving crop residues as cover or adding organic matter. However, as my first experience feeding the soil suggests, before trying to nurture, one needs to understand.
There is still so much more for me to learn about plants’ nutritional needs, but, why wouldn’t a revolutionary act of growing your own good food, take some time.
I don’t know. I don’t know what each one will do, but I desire to take the trickster’s approach:
“Martyr says: I will sacrifice everything to fight this unwinnable war, even if it means being crushed to death under the wheel of torment.
Trickster says: Okay, you enjoy that! As for me, I’ll be over here in this corner, running a successful little black market operation on the side of your unwinnable war.” – Big Magic
What will my successful little black market on the side be?
